QUESTIONS:
1. Former Sen. Russell B. Long (D.-La.) died last week at age 84. Almost every obituary of Long noted that he was the only senator in history whose parents had both served in the Senate. Can you name the person who had both parents serve in the Senate, but was defeated in his own attempt to become senator?
2. Who was the only U.S. senator in this century whose mother and father had both served in the House?
3. Long served as Senate Democratic whip from 1965-69. What Democratic senator did Long replace as whip?
4. Who unseated Long as whip in 1969?
5. Russell Long’s actual name was something else at birth, but his parents later changed his name legally. What was his original name and why was it changed?
ANSWERS:
1. Democrat Hubert H. Humphrey III, who lost a Senate race in Minnesota in 1988, and was the son of Democratic Senators Hubert Humphrey and Muriel Humphrey (who filled out the remainder of her late husband’s term from 1977-78).
2. Republican Howard Baker, senator from Tennessee from 1966-84, and son of Rep. Howard Baker, Sr. (R.-Tenn.), who served in the House from 1948 until his death in January of 1964, and Irene Baker, who served out the remainder of her husband’s term from 1964-65.
3. Hubert Humphrey, who resigned to become Vice President.
4. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D.-Mass.).
5. Huey P. Long III. His father later decided that young Huey would have an easier time in life if he didn’t have such a controversial name, so he was renamed Russell Billiu Long (after one of the attorneys who successfully defended Long in his impeachment trial while governor of Louisiana).
